A systematic review of interventions in secondary mathematics with at-risk students: mapping the literature
Date
2007
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Abstract
A systematic review of 3,814 published and unpublished citations identified in a literature search on interventions in secondary and early postsecondary mathematics with at-risk students between 1990 and 2004 was conducted. The goal of the systematic review was to identify those interventions which are most successful at improving the mathematics achievement of at-risk students while reducing the mathematics achievement gap. The utilization of a multi-phased coding process resulted in 100 empirical studies meeting the inclusionary criteria while yielding effect size estimates for a number of interventions and for multiple at-risk factors. This report summarizes these studies through a two-level mapping of the literature base. It identifies the interventions, at-risk factors, sample characteristics, study settings, and methodological research designs utilized in this body of empirical studies. The results of this approach suggest that those interventions identified as effective in increasing mathematics achievement with secondary and early postsecondary, at-risk students can be grouped into two primary intervention categories (a)Â pedagogical or instructional interventions, including cognitive and metacognitive approaches, cooperative learning, and peer tutoring, and (b)Â technology-based interventions. Two other types of intervention provided inconclusive results. No conclusions could be reached regarding curriculum interventions due to the small number of studies meeting the inclusionary criteria and the wide variety of curricular approaches included in those studies. The final results of the systematic review will be a series of research articles describing effective interventions for student populations with specific at risk factors. In addition, the results of this systematic review can be used to direct future research efforts by defining investigations into specific interventions with specific populations while informing the knowledge base.
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Subject
at risk
interventions
literature mapping
mathematics
mathematics education
secondary education
educational philosophy